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Sunday, May 29, 2011

Sabbath Day's Social Hotspot: The Mother's Lounge

Yeah, that's right - the mother's lounge. In every LDS church building, there is a room (usually it is a separate room you can only access from the women's restroom) where moms can bring their little babies to nurse, cry/scream, have their diapers changed, etc. in privacy and comfort. There is even a speaker which projects the music and speakers' voices from the chapel into the small room so that you don't have to miss a beat or a word of spiritual enlightenment if you so desire.

There are (unfortunately and fortunately - respectively), no mothers lounges and virtually no young mothers to report from a BYU single's ward - except for the occasional oddball like me. ;) Each Sunday, I would often have to go up a floor or two, grab a folding chair and nurse Lincoln in a bathroom stall, or find an empty classroom (with only writing desks) and cover up with a nursing cover and just hope some random person wouldn't pop in to practice the piano, or to teach their Sunday school class. It was an unnerving experience attending church on campus as a new (nursing) mommy, to say the least.

But, the last few weeks we have been attending a family ward in a real church building kind of like this one:

Boy oh boy, let me tell you about the Mother's Lounge! I never knew such a gift existed before these last few weeks of attending the family ward. When I step into that Mother's Lounge (a room sort of like this one),

not only do I have a place to care for my child in comfort and quiet, but I also step into a room brimming with mothers. Some with a child or two or three (or more) than I have, yet some who had their first baby within a week of mine.

We've hardly been in the ward long enough to know where each class meets, but I could already tell you the names of about 12 women and their opinions on several topics. I often find myself telling Squire:

"Oh that's So-and-So and she's the Young Women's president," or "That's So-and-so and she cloth diapers her baby too." "She is a registered post-postpartum doula." "She works at such-and such because. . . " (You get the idea.)

"How do you know all these people already?!"

"Oh, I just met her (them) in the Mother's Lounge," is my common response.